1. Corinthians 11: 23-26

Dear congregation, 

Birthdays, anniversaries and public holidays play an important role in life. They give us an opportunity to reflect on life and to remember. Our memory is a wonderful gift. We store our lives in our memories. It is a great treasure chest in which we accumulate easy and difficult, good and bad times. One of the greatest fears of many people is that they will lose their memory. If we lose our memory, we forget where we come from and how we came to be.

Our memory is not only of great importance in our personal lives, but also in that of every society. The shared memory of a nation or a group of people is just as important.

For example, living together is structured by public holidays and it is part of important political decisions as to which event deserves to be a public holiday. Shared remembrance has a special function and power because it promotes solidarity and community.

The Jewish and Christian faith is a faith in which memory and communal remembrance are central.

Sunday, Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, Sabbath, Passover, Yom Kippur, Hanukkah, Purim, to name but a few. A common narrative is necessary. The more people of faith tell their story, their origins, in the same way, the more cohesion there is.

Each of these festivals has a narrative, texts from Holy Scriptures make us aware of the origins of these holidays. After all, those who forget where they come from may at some point no longer remember where they are going to.

However, that should not happen. The way should be clear before us, the common path of Jews and Christians: the path to redemption from evil. The end of all trials and temptations.

The Lord's Supper, the holy sharing of bread and wine, is a memorial meal. It takes up the tradition of the Passover meal and the last evening of Jesus' life, when he washed the feet of his disciples. Both are to be remembered together and forever: The liberation from Egypt and the liberation from guilt, from the burden of death.

For our Catholic brothers and sisters, the preparation of the Holy Supper, the Eucharist, includes marvelling at ‘the mystery of faith’. It is good when we marvel at what we are reminded of. It is an ambivalent amazement: saddened, I marvel at what people do to each other: they enslave their fellow human beings and set themselves up as rulers. Overwhelmed with joy, I marvel that in every country and at all times, some people resist this temptation and seek ways to live better together.

Our faith is rooted in this: in the conviction that we as fellow human beings should serve one another instead of dividing the world into rulers and servants.

We remember this when we share bread and wine: a community in which everyone receives, and no one owns. We remember this when we stand together, side by side: each and every one with their story, their joy and their guilt, their successes and their failures - we remember that we are equal before God and receive liberation from God.

Let me take a leap to the Scripture for our sermon: these are the familiar words of institution which we say at Holy Communion.

²³ For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, ²⁴ and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” ²⁵ In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” ²⁶ For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

Paul reminds the Corinthians of something that they have long known and yet repeatedly forget: that the fellowship that comes about through trust in Jesus Christ is reflected in everyday life. The world recognises what it so often forgets by our actions, by the way we live together.

That is why Paul is so disappointed when he hears that in Corinth the Lord's Supper is no longer celebrated with devotion and holiness but has degenerated into a social gathering. Even worse, it is not a social gathering where good fellowship is celebrated, but where some celebrate and drink and fill their bellies while there is nothing left for the others. How is the world to recognise that Christ is alive among them and that their fellowship is founded in Christ? This is what worries Paul. The Corinthians are forgetful. Their common memory no longer works.

So, Paul reminds them: This is Christian memory training! And that's how these sentences came about, which have been remembered for two thousand years and which we hear when we celebrate communion. It is a commemorative meal to remind us of where we came from: we come from Judaism. And we come from the discipleship of Jesus: in our thoughts, we can sit or lie down at the table, just as it was customary back then. We can imagine ourselves with Peter and Judas and all the others. We can imagine Jesus washing our feet and showing us how much he loves us. He shows each and every one of us, and in doing so, he expresses the wish: Live as I have taught you.

Overcome the temptation to divide yourselves into the better group and the worse one; remember that you are brothers and sisters.

Overcome the temptation to think that one of you is more important than the other and remember that each one should serve the other. 

Overcome the temptation to worship Paul as the ruler of the world, rather remember him as the first servant among you. 

Jesus came into the world so that we could be redeemed. He does not make us his slaves, but his followers.

Let us remember and see it as a source of strength for our world.

A lot can be said today about the cultures of remembrance and commemoration, about the danger and opportunities because there are so many different days of remembrance in every country. That can be considered another time. A lot can also be said about how great the sting is that we Christians deny each other communion - but even that takes a back seat today. 

I want to emphasise that our communal partaking of Communion today has the power to create community and to renew our common memory. May this meal serve us: to place us in eternal communion with God and the temporal communion of all believers.

May it prevent us from abandoning and denying Jesus but rather confess with conviction and liberation that Jesus Christ is alive and among us.

Let us be and remain a community that nourishes trust, that offers bread and shares life. Let us be a church and a community that tells of our redemption. Let us be a church and a community in which we share questions and doubts and receive fresh bread and new wine. ‘He is the bread, he is the wine, rise and walk, hope grows. May the Lord bless you; he will not leave you alone!’ (EG 228,3)

May the peace of God, which is higher than our understanding, guard our hearts in Jesus Christ. Amen